One of the typical things you will find in any how-to book is a definition of the book’s subject. It is cliche but a good jumping-off point. On page 2 of my book The Mad Art of Caricature, I wanted to play the definition card. The problem was that the best definition I ever heard was one I could not for the life of me remember where I had heard it. That definition was:

“A caricature is a portrait with the volume turned up.”

I spent a fair amount of time trying to find out where I had heard that quote. At the time I wrote the book (late last spring) I did several Google searches for variations on the quote, and came up empty (actually just my own blog and that of a fellow caricaturist who I knew did NOT originate that quote came up). I paged through several caricature books I had including Bob Staake‘s The Complete Book of Caricature, Stephen Heller and Gail Anderson‘s The Savage Mirror and Wendy Wick Reaves‘ Celebrity Caricature in America… nada. I even asked a few other caricaturists I knew if they had any idea who said that. Again, no dice. I finally gave up and went with the following for the book:

From the Mad Art of Caricature, Chapter 1, Page 2:

The best definition I’ve ever heard—and sadly I cannot recall the source—is:

“A caricature is a portrait with the volume turned up.”

Some time after the book’s release I got an email from caricature illustrator extraordinaire John Kascht, letting me know that the quote was his. Hearing that, I am now sure I must have heard that quote during John’s presentation at the National Caricaturist Network’s annual convention in 2000 In San Diego, when he was the special guest speaker. That definition really stuck in my head, although my recollection of where I had heard it did not. That was 11 years ago…

John was mentioned two other times in the book as an example of excellence in caricature illustration, and is an artist I greatly admire. I feel badly that he did not get proper credit for the quote in my book, but I feel I did as much due-diligence as I reasonably could to find out who to attribute it to. Failing that, I made certain that anyone reading the book would not mistake that the definition was mine or think I was claiming it to be.

If the book ever goes to a second printing, this mistake will be corrected. In the meantime I wanted at least the readers of my blog to know who that terrific definition should be attributed to, with my apologies to John.

Q: What advice would you give on preparing and showing a portfolio for obtaining freelance work?

A: This question isn’t really from anybody specifically, but last week when visiting the Savannah College of Art and Design I did a round-table portfolio review for a group of students, and I thought some of the questions and information disseminated there would make for a good Sunday Mailbag post.

First off, let me say that the era of hauling around and showing a physical portfolio to art directors in pursuit of work is all but over. The term “portfolio” used to mean the leather case containing the bound samples of an artist’s work. Now it simply means the work itself, as more and more “portfolios” are websites. That said, much of the advice that used to apply to those physical portfolios still applies to showing your work to art directors, no matter what way this is done.

Here are what I think are some of the most important elements in preparing showing a portfolio in the pursuit of work:

1. Show them what they want to see, and nothing else- In the case of a specially tailored viewing (i.e. sending or showing work directly to an art director or potential client), do a little research and give some thought to what it is they are looking for. It does you little good to show funny animal illustrations to the art director of a sports magazine. That’s not to say you have to show that art director nothing but sports-related art, but try to focus what you do show them to what is relevant for their needs. In the case of a sports magazine, that would obviously be sports illustrations but also anything with action, caricatures, people or maybe crowd scenes. Also, the type of art they seem to lean towards matters. If most of the illustrations they use are on the realistic side, the goofy cartoon stuff would likely not appeal to them.
2. Leave out the sketches and unfinished work- It might be interesting to show other artists parts of your process, or other aspects of your artwork to show how “well rounded” you are, but art directors don’t care about that stuff. Unless part of what they are looking to hire someone for involves conceptual work or life drawing (like animation work, for example), leave that stuff out. They only want to see finished work that they can imagine printed in their publication or incorporated into their project.
3. Don’t overwhelm them with too many pieces- Fifteen to Twenty pieces are enough for them to get a solid idea of your abilities. Too many and it gets too long and arduous for the art director to slog through. Too few and it looks like you haven’t done much work.
4. Include as many published pieces as possible- Also either use an actual tear sheet or printout of the finished layout (type and graphics included). At worst include a label with client name and publication date. Any published pieces are like gold in your portfolio because it demonstrates to the client you have completed a job for a client, met a deadline and did work that met with client approval and was published/used.
5. Start and end the portfolio with your best pieces- This is an old cliche but a good one. You want to start and end strong, as that both gets the art director’s attention at the beginning and leaves them with a (hopefully) memorable piece at the end. The success of a portfolio showing is measured not by how impressed the art director is at the time they see it, but by how long they remember your work as the days (and potential jobs) go by.

The prevalence of virtual portfolios makes some of those points harder to accomplish, but they are still important. It might be easy to put up every single piece of art you have ever done in your website portfolio, but that is not wise. You can and should have more pieces up than twenty, but many dozen are too much. I keep my online portfolio limited to 45 pieces, which is plenty of pieces but still manageable to go through… especially using the scrolling thumbnail feature I have incorporated into my website design.

I always thought it would be a great feature on someone’s website to allow for a private portfolio section, where an artist can send an email link to an art director and invite them to look at a specially tailored selection of pieces just for them. That might be too much work to do very often, but it would allow an artist to put together a perfect amount of well-selected pieces to show.

Thanks to Nobody in Particular, MN  for the question. If you have a question you want answered for the mailbag about cartooning, illustration, MAD Magazine, caricature or similar, e-mail me and I’ll try and answer it here!

Art by John Martz

The deadline approaches… STOP PROCRASTINATING! If you are an art student/college student interesting in cartooning, send in your submissions for the Jay Kennedy Memorial Scholarship today! :

Jay Kennedy Scholarship

The annual Jay Kennedy Scholarship, in memory of the late King Features editor, was funded by an initial $100,000 grant from the Hearst Foundation/King Features Syndicate and additional generous donations from Jerry Scott, Jim Borgman, Patrick McDonnell and many other prominent cartoonists. Submissions are adjudicated by a panel of top cartoonists and an award is given to the best college cartoonist. The recipient is feted at the annual NCS Reuben Awards Convention attended by many of the world’s leading cartoonists.

Applicants must be students at a 4-year college in the United States, Canada or Mexico who will be a Junior or Senior during the 2012-2013 academic year. Applicants do not have to be art majors to be eligible for this scholarship.

Along with a completed entry form, applicants are required to send 8 samples of their own cartooning artwork (copies only); noting if and where the work has been published, either in print or on the web. (See application for details.) DO NOT send original artwork.

DEADLINE: ENTRIES MUST BE POSTMARKED BY DECEMBER 15, 2011

The applications will be judged by the National Cartoonists Society Foundation (NCSF) and the number of scholarships given out and their amounts will be at the discretion of the NCSF.

If you know of any college students who are cartoonists, whether that is their field of study or not, please let them know about this opportunity. The Jay Kennedy Scholarship has helped several talented artists pay for their schooling, and the more who apply, the merrier! Click here for more info!

Photo by Jamie Smith

I had a chance to meet a number of very talented and hospitable professors, underclassmen and grad students during my visit to the Savannah College of Art and Design last week. One of them got saddled with me as my “handler” (poor schmuck) and really did a great job making sure I had everything I needed for my student portfolio review session and the workshop I did at the SCAD museum. His name was Jamie Smith, and he has written a really terrific recap of the time he spent keeping me out of trouble in Savannah over on his blog… he actually makes it sound like I knew what I was talking about during those events! Thanks, Jamie!

Clicky to Embiggen

This two page spread appears in the latest issue of Sports Illustrated Kids magazine. The idea was to show a bunch of NBA players opening up their own stores and shops in a mall since they have nothing else to do during the lockout! The weird rectangle sof lighter color/values are where the text was to be placed by the SI folks.

I have to cheat on the SotW and post a rough sketch of a recent illustration project because I am under the gun being behind in the studio thanks to the Savannah trip last week and my trip to the ISCA convention in Florida tomorrow through most of the weekend. The above needs some modification, including the addition of some objects or interest in the lower right corner as the composition is imbalanced right now… probably will lose the bear from the gift bag, and instead add a large bear with a bow and a heart-shaped box of candy on the floor next to the bag.

Team Cul de Sac is the brainchild of Chris Sparks, who has worked tirelessly to organize this fundraising program for Parkinson’s research. It’s a part of TeamFox, the Michael J Fox Foundation’s fundraising arm, which in the last year alone raised almost 4 million dollars for research. The fundraiser revolves around the brilliant comic strip Cul de Sac by Richard Thompson, an incredibly talented cartoonist who happens to have Parkinson’s.

Team Cul de Sac invitied professional cartoonists, illustrators, artists and animators to donate original art made especially for a book, published by Andrews & McMeel, about Parkinson’s awareness. Part of the profits from the sales of the book will benefit the Michael J Fox Foundation, and the original art will be auctioned as part of the fundraiser with all of auction money going to MJFF. Additionally, there could be a limited number of deluxe edition books signed and numbered by Richard Thompson. The above is my contribution to the book.

Additional information can be found here and here. A very worthy cause for donation, even if you do not draw cartoons!

From left: Nick Meglin, myself, Paul Coker, Sergio Aragonés, Al Jaffee, Jack Davis and Sam Viviano. Clicky to Embiggen.

This past weekend I had the distinct privilege to participate in a gathering of some of the “Usual Gang of Idiots” (i.e. major contributors to MAD Magazine) hosted by the Southeast Chapter of the National Cartoonists Society and the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah Georgia. In attendance were long-time editor Nick Meglin, cartooning legends and members of the exclusive 50 year MAD contributor club, Paul Coker Jr., Jack Davis and Al Jaffee, soon to be member of that same club (next year) Sergio Aragonés, 30 year MAD artist and MAD art director for the last 13 years, Sam Viviano, and… uh… me. Only at MAD can you have been a regular contributor for over a decade, be 45 years old, and still be considered the “new kid”. Originally scheduled to attend and who could not make it for family health reasons was Don “Duck” Edwing, who was badly missed. Other long-time UGOI were contacted, including the incomparable Mort Drucker, but various circumstances make it impossible for them to be there.

Seriously, what a line-up. Throughout the weekend people were enthusiastic about the gathering, but I think it might have escaped most how unique it was to get Al, Jack, Paul, Nick and Sam all together at one time, Certainly that kind of gathering of greats has not happened since the legendary MAD trips Bill Gaines used to take the UGOI on. I was constantly pinching myself all weekend to even have been allowed in the same room as these awe-inspiring talents, let alone be billed alongside them.

The weekend was a mixture of presentations and workshops with the students and faculty of SCAD as well as members of the SEC NCS, tours, the opening reception of a public show of original MAD art from all the guests, and a free public panel discussion with all the attending UGOI. Here’s a rundown of the events I was able to attend, both public and private, with some pictures:

Thursday, Nov. 10th-

I got in early enough that I was able to attend Sam Viviano’s MAD 101 lecture Thursday night at 5:00 at the SCAD Museum of Art. Sam has a unique part of MAD history as he is the only major freelance contributor to become a full-time staff member. In his dual role as long-time artist and current art director, he has a perspective on the evolution of MAD from two distinct viewpoints. As a result, he is a voluminous repository of MAD lore, history and mythology, and is eminently qualified to lecture on the history of the magazine. Great presentation, and pretty well attended by SCAD students and faculty.

That night, with all of the visiting UGOI having arrived, we were able to go out and experience a little Savannah hospitality at the Crystal Beer Parlor!

Al Jaffee, Paul Coker, Jack Davis and Nick Meglin

Al and Paul arguing about gin vs. vodka martinis

Nick is exasperated as Sergio is being Sergio

Friday, November 11th-

In the morning we here taken on a quick tour of The Savannah College of Art and Design by the John Lowe, Dean of Communication Arts (and former inker for Archie, DC and Marvel). We visited the Digital Media Center (animation, etc), the Film and Motion Picture hall and the Sequential Arts (comics) building. There was a significant level of chaos at the time, as this week is the final week of the semester, and students were scrambling to get final projects done.

Me going into SCAD Digital Media Center

Touring a SCAD classroom

I have to take a moment here to say how incredibly impressive SCAD is. There are a number of schools that have a great programs in animation, film-making and other creative fields, but only a handful really teach comic art. SCAD is one of them, and it’s programs and students blew me away. Some schools seem to teach a “house” style, or shoehorn their students into certain approaches and solutions. SCAD really stresses the narrative aspects of comics, and while they are also extremely art-intensive, they allow students to explore their own unique styles of art within the context of good storytelling. They also challenge them to work within different styles and frameworks, but ultimately I got the feeling they help them to develop their own unique voices. The facilities were mind-boggling, especially the animation studio. Rooms and rooms of 20″ Cintiqs were everywhere, and we saw some incredible grad student animation projects that were basically their graduate thesises. Digital work abounded, but that said we walked into a large room full of old-school animation light boxes and were told that every student begins with mandatory study of traditional drawing as a foundation.

During the animation building tour, we saw how much these legendary MAD artists still influence young cartoonists and animators. We were just a group of old people being led through rooms of the studio, winding our way through all these young students busy at work… we didn’t have name tags or Alfred E. Neuman with us. Tagging along the back end of the group was Jack Davis, grinning and gawking at all the artwork we saw. My wife, The Lovely Anna, was bringing up the vanguard, making sure none of the MAD guys got too interested in any of the artwork and missed the group moving on. Jack said hello, in the southern gentlemanly way Jack does, to three young ladies working on an animation project. They politely said hello back and asked him to have a nice day. I’m sure they were thinking “what a nice old man” as he wandered past. Anna leaned over to them as she came by and whispered to one of the girls, “That was Jack Davis you just said hello to.” The girl went white as a sheet and started shaking stammering… “J-J-J-J-ack DAVIS?!?” They ran after him and were so excited to meet him they barely got three words out. Jack drew a self portrait on the whiteboard and Anna took their picture with him, promising to send it to them after gathering up their email addresses. Those girls were maybe twenty years old, and they not only knew who Jack was, but they understood what a giant of cartooning he is. Great work transcends time.

Jack drawing for the animation students

Jack is an irrepressible ladies man!

Later that afternoon some of us met with groups of students to review portfolios. I had a diverse group of talent in my review session, including international students from Indonesia and Brazil (if I remember correctly). Some great talent, and an obvious desire for advice and direction. It was fun to get to meet a few of the students in the comic’s program, and see what kind of work they were doing.

That night we has a reception at the MAD Art Exhibit at SCAD’s Poetter Hall. The exhibit featured pieces from each of the visiting MAD artists, and it was a great show.

Paul Coker, Me, Jack Davis, Sergio Aragonés, Sam Viviano and Nick Meglin.
Al Jaffee was MIA… rumored to have been around the corner showing some
co-eds how he could do 100 one-handed pushups.

It goes without saying the artwork was awesome… some of the best stuff was seeing preliminary sketches and pencils as well as the finished art for several pieces by Paul Coker, as it was fascinating to see his process. Also hanging at the show were the 15 finalists of an art competition SCAD did with their comic art students. The contest was to create a Spy vs. Spy comic, and there was some innovative and creative solutions on display. It was interesting to see how some people stuck close to the original Prohias style of the Spies, and others went in much more original directions. We MAD men had to judge the finalists and select three winners.

Al, Jack and Sam at the reception

Paul Coker and me, judging the Spy vs. Spy work

Hard to believe this art snuck into the show…

The MAD Gang with the Spy vs. Spy competition winner Meg Casey, at left is
Anthony “Fish” Fisher, the Chair of SCAD’s Sequential Art Dept.

Later that evening the Southeast Chapter of the NCS and SCAD had a welcome reception for everyone at the SCAD Museum.

Saturday, Novemeber 12th-

I started the day at the official business meeting of the NCS Southeast Chapter. It was really the chapter, especially chairman Jack Pittman, Nick Meglin and Michael Jantze, (The Norm and Jantze Animation) who is both an NCS SEC member and a professor at SCAD, who were the driving force behind this whole weekend. Michael got SCAD involved, and they enthusiastically got behind the idea and helped turn it into a big event, but it was the NCS SEC that made it happen. Nick especially got these legends to come to Savannah to get together, being long-time friends with them all. They just turned their annual fall meeting into a cartooning event that made CNN and countless other news outlets. Speaking as president of the National Cartoonists Society, the SEC is a model chapter not only for putting on this event but for the way they keep active and run their group. I was greatly impressed.

Later that morning there was an informal sort of workshop conducted for NCS SEC members by the UGOI. Yep. No pressure. Just me drawing in front of a crowd with Jack Davis, Paul Coker, Al Jaffee, Sergio Aragonés and Sam Viviano. No big deal. Piece of cake. <8O

Sergio does his thing!

Jack does his thing!

My demo… I think Paul is laughing at me!!

After lunch a number of SEC members and a few MAD guys did some student workshops at the museum. These ran simultaneously and while the groups were small they were a lot of fun. I did a workshop on caricature, and other artists who participated were:

• Robert Pope:  Making the script serve the visual while preserving the author’s intent
• Andy Smith: Drawing Dynamic Comics
• John Lotshaw: Self-Publishing and distribution strategy
• Jack Cassidy: Editorial Humorous Illustration and Gag Cartooning
• James “Doodle” Lyle: Demystifying Inking
• Stephanie Gladden-Miller: Drawing Characters “On-Model”
• Sergio Aragonés: Cartooning
• Jim Massara: Presenting your Work to Editors
• Jack Pittman & Grey Blackwell: Opportunities in Cartooning

Wish I could have attended a few of those, but I was busy doing my workshop.

That night was the grand event, the MAD Chat Panel Discussion at the Trustees Theater.

The MAD Chat Panel

Wow! Big billing! Photo by Michael Jantze

The MAD gang onstage- photo by Anthony Fisher

There was a great crowd, probably around 600-700 people. The chat was moderated by the quick-witted Nick Meglin, and there were plenty of laughs, great stories and about 300 years of collective cartoon wisdom onstage. I was there for security and to sweep up afterward. Some of the funniest moments were impromptu, like when Jack’s cell phone kept going off and he couldn’t figure out how to turn off the ringer. Unfazed, Nick kept firing off one-liners about it. Jack’s sheepish grin was priceless.

Nick is merciless to poor Jack and his ringing cellphone. Al is amused.

I look on as Sergio and Sam tell a story

Nick, Jack, Al and Paul Coker

Towards the end of the panel, SEC NCS chairman Jack Pittman presented Paul Coker with the “Jack Davis Award” for outstanding achievement in cartooning. Well deserved!

Jack Pittman presents “the Jack Davis” to Paul Coker

Sergio and Sam admire Paul’s award

Afterward there was an autograph session with the whole gang, signing books, issues of MAD and all sorts of stuff…

The UGOI signing stuff. From far end: Sergio, Al, me, Sam, Paul and Jack

That’s a big line!

Me, Sam and Paul

What an awesome weekend. I missed all the mythic MAD trips, and this might be as close as I will ever get to experiencing what that was like. It was a great honor to be able to spend some time with these guys, who are all idols of mine, let alone be included among them. A BIG thanks to the NCS Southeat Chapter, especially Jack Pittman, Nick Meglin, Julie Negron and James “Doodle” Lyle for all the hard work, to SCAD for all the support and hospitality, especially Michael and Nicole Jantze, Anthony and Tera Fisher, John Lowe and all the faculty and grad students who shuttled us about and kept us out of trouble.

Oh, yeah… there was also a silent auction of donated art including some stuff from several of the MAD artists. The proceeds go to both the NCS SEC and the National Cartoonists Society Foundation/Milt Gross fund. I won this little gem done by Paul:

Jealous? Clicky to embiggen…

For those who aren’t familar with Paul Coker’s work, he didn’t just work for MAD. He has done a lot of other stuff including being the artist who did the character designs for the Rankin-Bass animated Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town and about a dozen other specials and shorts you know and love. This piece was done for MAD as part of a spoof of updated holiday programs… funny that they had the original artist to do the parody already in the fold!

Q: You must have accumulated a ton of digital artwork since you’ve been working as a professional illustrator. How do you go about saving, backing up and archiving your files so that you never lose them?

A: That’s one of the things that sucks about digital artwork—you are one electrical surge away from losing it all unless you are careful to back things up.

I tried several methods to make sure I properly backed up all my work. First, I would pick up my computer, open the drive bay door and attempt to shake out all the 0′s and 1′s that made up the binary code of my art files, scoop them up and keep them in empty coffee cans in my basement. This did not work well because all those 0′s and 1′s got all over the place and I was sure I’d lose some and when I poured them back in later to reconstitute my image, Harry Plodder’s nose would be missing or something. Worse, those 0′s and 1′s were apparently so small I couldn’t even see them, and I was afraid no matter how hard I shook the computer some would be stuck in there. So, I abandoned that idea.

Next, I thought I’d print the binary data out on paper, put them in folders and file them away. That way, although I’d have to retype it all should my original files get lost (no big deal, how long could that take?), they’d be safe for posterity. This idea I also abandoned when my first attempt to print the binary code of a MAD page went through an entire ream of paper before my printer started smoking and I pulled the plug.

Finally, I decided to everything up on DVDs. This is also not the best method, as DVDs apparently deteriorate or at least as technology becomes more advances and formats change, early DVDs become harder to read. My newer Macs don’t like my very oldest DVDs anymore. I had to use a friend’s computer to read these files and transfer them to a thumb drive to store elsewhere.

These days I have a double redundant backup plan. I have two external hard drives hooked to my studio computer. One is used as a Mac OS X “Time Machine” drive, which in general backs up all my files. The other drive uses a program called SuperDuper that backs up just my documents and art files daily. That was all three drives would need to fail at once to lose anything.

Eventually I might turn to cloud storage for another alternative. These files are big and it would take a long time to back this up on Dropbox or similar, but having an offsite storage plan would even guard against fire or some other localized natural disaster

Bottom line- BACK UP YOUR FILES. Disaster will strike, eventually.

Thanks to Matthew Cox for the question. If you have a question you want answered for the mailbag about cartooning, illustration, MAD Magazine, caricature or similar, e-mail me and I’ll try and answer it here!

I’m currently in Savannah, GA attending an event put together by the Southeast Chapter of the National Cartoonists Society and the Savannah College of Art and Design, featuring a gaggle of Idiots.

No, not the cast of Jersey Shore.

It’s a gathering of some of the “Usual Gang of Idiots”, as the contributors of MAD Magazine call themselves. As you can see from the list above, it includes some of the true greats from the magazines history, and also me.

Some of the conference involves private seminars and workshops with SCAD students. I’ll be doing a workshop on caricature and participating in portfolio reviews, etc. There are two events that are open to the public, however, that would be worth a trip to Savannah to check out.

Tonight there will be an opening of a MAD Artist Exhibit featuring original work by all the participating MAD artists. The exhibit is located at The Creative Coast, 15 West York Street, Savannah, GA 31401 SCAD Poetter Hall, 342 Bull Street, Savannah, GA**:

• 5:00pm Reception: Open to Special Guests, NCS members, and Faculty Only
• 6:00pm Exhibit open to public and students

Saturday evening is  “A SCAD, MAD, MAD, MAD Discussion,” a panel discussion with some of the original artists from MAD from 5–6:30 p.m. at the Trustees Theater, 216 E. Broughton St., Savannah, Georgia. This panel will be free and open to the public.

Scheduled to appear on the panel include:

• Jack Davis. Davis was one of the original cartoonists for MAD in 1952. He illustrated the very first story in the very first issue of MAD.
• Al Jaffee. With his first piece in 1955, Savannah-born Jaffee is MAD’s longest-running freelance contributor. He is best known for creating one of the magazine’s trademark features, the MAD fold-in. Every issue since April of 1964 has featured a Jaffee fold-in.
• Paul Coker, Jr. Coker has been a contributor to MAD since 1962 and has appeared in over 300 issues.
• Nick Meglin. Meglin is a former editor of MAD Magazine, a position he held for over thirty years.
• Sergio Aragones. Aragones has been at MAD since 1963. He distinguished himself with his “Marginal Thinking” strips, which were printed up, down, across, and around the corners of comic panels to fill in the margins.
• Sam Viviano. Viviano began his MAD career as a freelance artist and while still illustrating articles also currently serves as MAD’s art director.
• Tom Richmond. Richmond will be serving coffee and sweeping up afterward.

There will be a book signing afterwards with Al signing his new book Al Jaffee’s MAD Life, Sergio will be signing copies of his new comic book Sergio Aragones’ Funnies, and I’ll have copies of my book.

Unfortunately Duck Edwing had to bow out due to a family medical issue. That’s a shame, because he is one funny guy and I hadn’t seen him in years.

This will be fun. If you are anywhere near Savannah, it will be worth coming by. I serve a mean cuppa Joe.

** EDIT- Ooops, there are actually two exhibits of MAD work going on this weekend, and the one located at The Creative Coast, 15 West York Street, Savannah, GA are actually the ones donated for the silent auction, which I neglected to mention. These pieces have been up all wee and will be there through today, then will move over to the Trustees Theater on Saturday for final live bidding from 6:30 PM to 7:00 PM, with winners declared at 7:00. Proceeds will help support both the NCS Southeast Chapter and it’s programs as well as the Milt Gross Fund/National Cartoonists Society Foundation, the NCS’s charity arm.